Corks and rubber corks are good, but what I nearly always do is pluck a bunch of moist green grass just the right amount so that when I twist it, double it over and twist again it fits nicely into the spout of the smoker. This way I get to save and re-use any 'precious' fuel such as well-rotted burlap. I mostly stuff grass into the ventilation tube at the bottom as well. Then put the smoker into a safe container like a metal pail, just in case it re-ignites (which it never has, using this method). Bunches of moist green grass are great, too, for putting in the smoker, on top of any fuel which is burning too hot. Smoke should be COOL, WHITE & DENSE. Puff it on the back of your hand to check (like putting your elbow in to check the temperature of the baby's bathwater!).

Cindi,Interesting to hear your records from last year, seeing how we share a zone. A local beek told me at one of ron's seminars that he uses sumac flowers to burn in his smoker. Gonna try that! With ron we didn't have the luxury so we always used burlap. I always plug my smoker with moss, and it seems ok. I like the idea of a can inside the smoker now that should extend its life! Finskys fugus is also a traditional salish cancer cure. We have a lot of polypores in our backyard. my fiance picked some because she like the look, and when we looked them up they were a firestarter used apparently for thousands of years in europe. We tried them out in the fireplace starting a fire and they were awesome. Though I have to agree with brian the hard part is keeping the darn things going!

Steve, when we took our courses at Ron's we used shredded white paper. Interesting that he has gone to burlap, maybe it is better surely.

The polypores, that one that you put a picture on looks like the ones that I pick off the stumps to draw pictures on, but maybe are simply a different species. Does the one that you picked have a white/beige kind of flat bottom on it (picture an area that you could draw a picture)?

I have the staghorn sumac growing on my property, I would imagine that that would be the sumac that you are speaking of. Never thought of that for fuel, I have many of the red cones that produced the flowers last year still on the trees. Maybe I'll give that a whirl. Evidently, the staghorn sumac is good for the bees to, think they gather pollen from it, so that is a bonus.

What trees did your fiance find the polypores on? Great day. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Good to hear someone else uses sumac MB, they are the red flowered ones here. Cindi, the polypore in the pic is called tinder polypore, its hoof sized at maturity. The larger shelf polypores you mention are resinous polypore, and conifer base polypore, they grow to dinner plate size and are often used to paint or draw on. At least the ones we found here were. My guide book says the tinder pp habitat is dead conifers, or live maple, birch, beech, hickery, polar, and cherry. That narrows it down eh? Stef collected it during a day of mushroom picking and didn't note the habitat, but I have yet to see more of them compared to the others which are everywhere here. Here is a picture of the underside.

<Good to hear someone else uses sumac MB, they are the red flowered ones here. Cindi, the polypore in the pic is called tinder polypore, its hoof sized at maturity. The larger shelf polypores you mention are resinous polypore, and conifer base polypore, they grow to dinner plate size and are often used to paint or draw on. At least the ones we found here were. My guide book says the tinder pp habitat is dead conifers, or live maple, birch, beech, hickery, polar, and cherry.>

Steve, now that is great information. I gather them all the time like I said for writing on. I have not saved the ones that didn't turn out too good, too bad that I didn't.

I have given several of the "shelf polypores" to my daughters when they were very young that I had drawn pictures on. To this day the pictures are still entirely visible. That would be say, 25 or more years ago. The shelf polypores that I drew for them were very large, perhaps the size of dinnerplates.

It is nice to know the actual name of the fungus. I always wondered what they were called, and now I do.

I am going to gather the Sumac cones soon, I will dry them and add them to my smoker collection, that will be burlap, polypores and Sumac cones. This will be good smoke for the bees. But as I said before, I am going to attempt working the hives without smoke this year and see what comes of it. I will not be stupid and not have the smoker at hand, but I won't puff it if I don't have to.

There are alot of very edible mushrooms in our area. I am not familiar enough with the mushroom kingdom to feel comfortable in gathering, but I know in the fall there are shrooms aplenty.

We used to have horses here years ago and we always had in plenty those darn psyllisybum (spelling) Stuntz' mushrooms. Evidently they are not as halucinogenic as the liberty caps, but I have read they still contain the chemical they both possess. From my youth memories I can identify the magic mushrooms. I often wondered if the horses got high from grazing around these little fungi. Probably not, never saw any crazy acting horses out there. Oh well.

This is a picture of a polyspore, now whether it is a small shelf polypore or a timber polypore, that is left to the unknown. It is about the size of a fist, it was one that I had kept because my neice drew a pretty picture on it and I liked it. The pic is a little blurry, it is looking at it from the side.

Great day. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Yes we do live in a magic kingdom. There are more mushrooms growing throughout the wet seasons than I have ever seen. I have hiked a lot over the years and love to go wandering off trails, but I have never even seen some of these mushrooms that are right on the back lawn. we were after edibles the day we were picking, because we have a friend who used to pick these boletes that grow aplenty out back here. She used to collect mushrooms with her grandmother back in Poland and insisted we could eat them. We also found Li chin mushrooms (Mushroom of immortality) a mushroom reserved for the emperor in ancient times and supposedly quite good for you :) , hemlock pufballs, and chicken mushrooms (shelf polypores that actually taste like chicken). The boletes were very disgusting looking, and our friend maria and I were the only ones who would eat them. They turn blue when bruised but are not psilocybian. I was worried about that because this is the first non hallucinogenic mushroom that I have ever seen that is. (and I had to work that day) We also have some pretty deadly galerinas here which grow right along side the wavy blue halo or cyanescens psilos. I am amazed that more kids don't get sick or die because of that. I always see THE DUDE, hat turned sideways, dragging his oversized pants through the grass looking for shroomies at parks here. I go for walks and during the wet season I have to laugh because there is usually some kid picking everything he sees and throwing it in a plastic bag. None the less, we have found some really good boletes that I can safely add to my edibles list. I believe I beat cancer when I was younger because of medicinal mushrooms that we all don't pay any attention to. At the time i had to drive to Chinatown and buy them from herbalist shops, now a days I can sell them, but I don't, its like having a medicine cabinet out back. My book lists the range for tinder mushrooms as all the way down to texas so thats interesting that they are so wide spread, and well received within such a massive range MB. Usually the guide book range is limited by climate change or cross breeding with local varieties. Mine are hard as rocks now because they are dried out but I would like to try some one day.

Steve, sounds like you are into the mushroom catch. That is good, our area supports so many different types of mushrooms. If there ever was a club that I would like to join it would be the "mushroom" one, is it called mycology or something like that?

I have two very good books on mushrooms of the PNW and it is truly amazing how many species, but so many look alikes that I got rather turned off. Anyways, in the wrong forum. Have a great day. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Ann, thanks, it looks like there is only on on Vancouver Island, too far away for me. I am sure that my area would have a club, particularly as we have mushrooms galore. If I ever find that extra time, that would be an interest like I said, maybe after summer. Great day. Cindi

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There are strange things done in the midnight sun by the men who moil for gold. The Arctic trails have their secret tales that would make your blood run cold. The Northern Lights have seen queer sights, but the queerest they ever did see, what the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge, I cremated Sam McGee. Robert Service

Smokers are easy to start, but harder to get the right smoke. I'm pretty sure i got the right kind of smoke going and feel im set for the summer.

Now I couldn't figure out how to put the smoker OUT!

any suggestions?

nepenthes; Yes smokers are easy to get started, if you don't pack it so full of fuel that it can't breathe. My choice of fuel is pine straw. If i were to use burlap i would wash it to remove the oils and chemicals that it may contain to retard rodents and fire. The same for baler twine. Its very simple to put the smoker out, just stick a corn cob in the smoke spout. Place the smoker in a metal container such as a bucket or smoker box. Charlie

I agree with cindi I always use green vegetation I like to open smoker and put a plug of it on inside of smoker push in firmly till it just startes to come out of hole on other side as for smoker fuel pine needles work great get fire going real good and then pack in as much as possible as you are packing keep pumping bellow till you get a nice cool white smoke smells good to will last for a hour or so gnhoney